The "Digital Communities" category will honor important achievements by digital communities as well as innovative artistic approaches towards web-based communities. This category focuses attention on the wide-ranging social and artistic impact of the Internet as well as on the latest developments in the fields of social software, ubiquitous computing, mobile communications and wireless networks. Special attention goes to community-related “net.art”. "Digital Communities" spotlights bold and inspired innovations impacting human coexistence, bridging the geographical as well as gender-based digital divide and cultural conflicts, sustaining cultural diversity and the freedom of artistic expression or creating outstanding social software and enhancing accessibility of technological-social infrastructure. This category showcases the political and artistic potential of digital and networked systems and is thus designed as a forum for the consideration of a broad spectrum of projects, programs, artworks, initiatives and phenomena in which social and artistic innovation is taking place, as it were, in real time. A Golden Nica, two Awards of Distinction and up to 12 Honorary Mentions will be awarded in the Digital Communities category in 2008.

I am surprised that they recognized us, given their emphasis, but I'm very grateful, because it means that there is an awareness that what we did was innovative and well worth doing.

In rural regions of China today, there are more than 400,000 elementary and secondary schools, almost all of which are suffering from notorious shortages of personnel, textbooks and other teaching materials. “1kg more” deals with this problem in a way that is as uncomplicated as it is unusual. This wiki doesn’t just call attention to existing shortcomings; it also calls upon travelers to China to pack just one more kilo into their luggage—desperately needed teaching material—and to deliver it where it’s needed. “1kg more” thus makes simple yet effective use of the quotidian mobility of an enormous number of people, and has this quickly made it China’s fastest growing and most effectively networked NGO. Now, it’s being honored with the 2008 Golden Nica in the Digital Communities category.

There were 4,056 entrants from 62 countries considered this year. And to give you context, Ratatouille and SpiderMan3 won Honorable Mentions in the category of Computer Animation; and Drupal also won an Honorable Mention in the Digital Communities category. It's a prestigious award, and it's genuinely an honor to be listed.

So, this is for all of you, and I know you join me in saying thank you for the recognition. And if you need any proof that this is a group award, here's a new permanent page, listing all the interviews that Sean Daly has done for Groklaw in the last couple of years, so you can find them easily. Look in the menu for Sean Daly. Of course, he has written a couple of articles for us too: